“What?”
Rief shrugged as best as he could. “It was just a guess, but no sailor as experienced as Torino would’ve made that mistake. They wouldn’t be the first owner and captain to commit fraud.”
“Did he admit to it?” Mathew demanded, not putting such corruption past his father. The man would do anything for money—including blackmailing his only heir.
“Not in so many words, but I made the mistake of putting my back to him, and he hit me in the head.” He gestured weakly to the leaking gash on his brow. “When I woke up, the loft was on fire. I should have seen this coming. I had a vision of fire, I just didn’t understand. I just didn’t understand!”
Squeezing his hand tight, Mathew quickly assured him, “Do not blame yourself, Rief. You saw a fire, but how could you have known my father would set it? Please do not take on any more guilt, I cannot bear it. Not when the fault lies on my shoulders.”
“How so?”
Mathew glanced around to assure himself no one could overhear. “He saw us in the alley.”
“Oh.”
“Indeed,” he said wryly. “You may have seen the fire, my love, but it was my foolishness which sparked it. It was stupid, and I never should have done that.”
Face contorting, Rief pursed his quivering lips. “Please don’t say that. No matter what happens, I cannot regret a single moment.”
Mathew gave his hand one last squeeze before wisely releasing him. “Neither do I, but we will have to be more careful from now on. If we are going to stay together, we have to be smarter.”
“Stay together?” he said in a voice barely above a whisper.
“Yes,” he said firmly, giving Rief a look that brooked no disobedience.
A dumbstruck expression crossed Rief’s face, and he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing on his throat. “Well, how are we going to handle this?”
“Indeed.” Mathew dropped back on his ass, his mind buzzing like a swarm of angry bees. The blood that had been thrumming through his body, fueling the frantic rescue attempt, had lost its influence. Weakness and shock settled in, leaving his limbs to tremble with exhaustion. He placed his arms on his knees, and his hands began to shake from the trauma of almost losing Rief and the weight of his father’s corruption and hatred.
The continuous verbal wounds from his father felt freshly torn open, but this time anger overtook the hurt—anger at himself. After the threats against him today, per his usual, Mathew had kowtowed under his authority. Rather than stand up and fight him like a man, he’d planned to take the coward’s way out by running.
Any why? Fear of a man who had never loved him?
How foolish he had been!
Father had always seen Mathew as a burden, the physical reminder of a lost wife and a fortune he wanted more than a relationship with his own son. Yet despite a life of degradation and torment, Mathew had never managed to suppress the desire for Father’s approval.
Well, no more.
By raising his cruel hand against the man Mathew loved, he’d crossed a line there was no coming back from.
“Matt?”
He stared at Rief, the singed eyebrows, blood congealing on his hairline, and the burned clothes. Seeing him injured and in pain did something to Mathew, enflaming a protective instinct within him he didn’t even know he had. Rief had trusted him with his secrets, his body, and his heart. With such trust came a responsibility. Father could try to ruin them if he dared, but Mathew would be damned if he allowed anyone to hurt Rief.
Not when he had the power to stop it.
Done rolling over like a hound and letting his father’s manipulative ways influence his decisions, Mathew would end this once and for all.
Tonight.
A determination burning brighter than the blaze destroying Rief’s home rose up within Mathew, taking with it a colossal weight from his shoulders. Though the scent of smoke permeated the air, it was suddenly easier to breathe. He clenched his teeth, mind made up. “He will pay for this, Rief. Do not fear. I will handle him.”
“How?”
Mathew took hold of those gifted hands that created beauty, both dark and light. Hands that gave him pleasure and showed him affection. The very hands that had saved Mathew from drowning in the sea, then brought him out of a life of misery. Nothing would threaten the precious relationship they had embarked upon again. Before this night ended, Mathew would more than salvage the wreckage his father had left behind.
He would lay the groundwork for clear skies ahead.
“Trust me, I will fix everything,” Mathew vowed. “If my father wants a fight, I’ll give it to him.”
Chapter Sixteen
“This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
—William Shakespeare; Hamlet Act 1 Scene 3
“Open up, you bastard!”
There was a scramble and muttered curses from the other side of the door.
Mathew hammered his fist against the wood again. Though the middle of the night, he didn’t care if he woke the entire inn. After leaving Rief at Chambers’s home with the doctor, the time had come to put out another fire. “I said open up, right now!”
Hair askew and wearing a long nightshirt, Father threw open the door. Sleepy confusion gave way to shock when he spied Mathew, soot-covered and still wet from the brigade, standing in the hall. “What the devil is the matter with you, boy?”
Mathew shoved past to enter the room. Snatching up the man’s housecoat from the edge of the bed, he threw it at him. “Dress yourself. We have business to discuss.”
“Any business you have can wait until morning.”
“I think not,” he said as he lit the candle on the dresser. After a brief visit to the Bloody Hog and an hour of pouring over their loan contract, Mathew was ready to have it out with Father once and for all.
Blustering, his father pulled on the coat and yanked the belt into a knot. “How dare you intrude upon me in this fashion?”
Mathew advanced on him, no more hesitation or fear ruling him in this cowardly man’s presence. “How dare you attack an innocent man?”
He flinched, blinking a few times until his vision grew accustomed to the light. Mathew knew the moment his mind woke from the fog of sleep when sinister pride glinted in his eyes. “I haven’t the faintest notion what you’re talking about.”
“Save your lies for the gambling table, Father. It is bad enough that you risked my business by making a fraudulent deal with Torino, but then you assaulted Rief, and burned down his home.”
“Rief?” he repeated with a sneer. “Who is that?”
“My lover.” A giddy sense of triumph filled him at his father’s obvious revulsion.
“I won’t listen to your perversions,” he snapped. “Get out of my sight this instant.”
He studied his father’s countenance, the deep lines and bruising under his eyes, the gray streaks in his once thick, dark hair. He looked haggard. Old. At one time he’d represented the epitome of masculinity to Mathew, but now all he saw was a pathetic old man, consumed by jealousy, greed, and hatred. His own anger receded, replacing itself with a pity akin to how one might feel for a feral dog needing to be put down.
“Why do you hate me so, Father?” Emotions wavered his voice. Swallowing hard, he continued, “You can’t simply hate me for my fortune, could you?”
Father crossed his arms, raising his chin with a haughty air. “Don’t you mean my fortune?”
Apathy fast replaced the pity, and Mathew gave a weary chuckle. “You have not answered my question. Why do you hate me?”
It surprised him how desperately he wanted that answer. How badly he needed to hear the truth from his father’s own lips. More surprising still, was that despite everything, a part of him hoped he might say: “I don’t hate you, son. I love you.”
Oh, but how foolhardy such flights of fancy were!
“The very sight of you makes me ill,�
�� his father spat with a contempt that made Mathew flinch. “You are a weak-minded fool. Incompetent. You inherit a fortune and the first thing you do is buy a fancy wardrobe like a silly girl. And your latest behavior sickens me to my stomach. Do you think Elaine would’ve given you a shilling if she’d known that you like getting buggered?”
Despite the all-too-familiar repulsion in blue eyes that were so much like his own, a sad sense of relief and wistfulness came over Mathew. “You are incorrect on several counts. I am neither weak-minded nor incompetent. Nor is any man buggering me. If you must know, I’m the one doing the buggering, Father. Does that, at least, please you?”
His face curled up in disgust. “You’re sick.”
With that, Mathew allowed the last remnants of hope that his father might love him fade into the mist. “No, Father. It is you who are sick. Sick with greed and selfishness. You are so full of hate that you have sealed your own fate. From this day onward, I am done with your sickness. The moment you raised your hand against the man I love, you dug your own grave. And I intend to sow the grass upon it.”
His father’s face contorted, as if looking upon something as putrid and festering as his own black heart. “Listen to yourself, saying such things,” he hissed. “You cannot love another man.”
“Oh, but I can and I do,” he countered, courage mounting. “And I am going to stay here and keep on loving him until the day I die. As for you, Father, I want you out of my life forever. Unless you want to be arrested, you had best be on the next ship off this island.”
He scoffed. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“I am offering you a chance to avoid punishment. I am feeling generous, so I shall pay for your passage, and if you go quietly, I will even give you some pocket money. All I ask is that you leave Key West and never return.”
“Why? So you can live your life of debauchery? The two of you should be drawn and quartered for your revolting ways. I am not afraid of you. No one will believe a pervert over a man of my station.”
Mathew gaped at him, baffled by his continued arrogance. “Have you taken leave of your senses? In a town built solely by and for wrecking, whose word do you think the judge will take when Rief testifies that you blackmailed and assaulted him? You also destroyed the warehouse of a prominent Key West merchant, threatening the lives and possessions of everyone in this town. Did you really think you could get away with that?”
The barest flash of panic showed in those confident eyes. “Continue to threaten me, and I will expose you, Mathew.”
He shrugged, serenity wrapping around him, for he had nothing to lose and everything to gain. “That is simply your word against mine.”
“I have proof.”
Mathew actually chuckled, shaking his head at the man’s reckless determination. “What proof? Do you plan to call that chicken as witness?”
Laughing triumphantly, his father threw open the top drawer of the bureau. “This is all the proof of your depravity I need.”
Taken aback, Mathew stared at the leather book he threw upon the bed. It was one of Rief’s sketchbooks, some of the drawings peeking out from the edges. Mathew didn’t have to look to know he was doubtless the subject of many of them.
“When I show everyone the drawings he made of you, they will all know,” he declared, jabbing his finger into the sketchbook. “What say you now?”
Mathew laughed.
“Why are you laughing? This will ruin you.”
“I laugh because I finally understand why you are such a terrible gambler.”
“What?”
“You show your hand much too easily.”
“This is proof. You cannot deny that you are on almost every page of that nasty book.”
Oftentimes, extreme relief came out in the form of hilarity, and Mathew could not stop his laughter. He dabbed at the tears in his eyes, chuckling. “That book is merely proof that you were in Rief’s house before you burned it to the ground, fool.”
Visibly befuddled by his mirth, his father faltered. “No, it isn’t.”
“Your mouth says one thing, but your eyes say another. You’ve played your only hand, Father, and now the game is forfeit.” Before his father could stop him, Mathew sobered, snatching the book from the bed.
“Give that back at once,” he commanded, expecting obedience.
“I think not.” He tucked the book behind him, out of the man’s reach. He didn’t fear his father anymore, because Mathew held all the cards. He always had, it just took until now before he realized it. “As I said, I want you on the next ship off this island. If you dare linger in order to defame Lawson Salvage to Judge Marvin, or if you say one word about my relationship with Rief, I will see to it that you serve prison time for conspiracy, assault, and arson.”
“I’m not going to prison.” He laughed. “I’ll tell everyone that you are lying because you are a sodomite. My lawyers will destroy you.”
“And where will you produce the monies to pay for these lawyers?”
“I have plenty of money,” he snarled.
“No,” Mathew stated. “You do not. Pembroke Manor is mortgaged beyond its worth. Any money I have given you has been lost on a card table.”
“I’ll expose you if you dare do this to me.”
“Expose me?” he said with a laugh. “You should worry more for your own skin, Father. I paid a visit to your friend Torino tonight. It is amazing how much information one can glean by means of a hefty purse.”
“He’s a lying scoundrel,” he declared, waving his hands.
“A lying scoundrel you hired to run our ship aground. Torino told me all about your secret insurance adjuster and the policy he drew up for you. What a bloody fool you are. Taking out a second policy on a ship which is not even yours. Did you actually believe that you could keep that policy from Kirkwood and me? Even if the ship had been a total loss, any policy is payable to the owners of a company, not the former owners.”
His father paled. “What are you implying?”
“I imply nothing and only state facts. Thanks to your greed and deceit, the moment our ship wrecked, you ceased to be a partner in Pembroke & Kirkwood Trading.”
“T-that’s preposterous!” he shouted.
“Perhaps you should reread our loan contract. Mr. Kirkwood included a very important clause you may have overlooked,” Mathew said, rolling up on the balls of his feet. “If you are unable to pay back the loan I gave you in its entirety after this first venture, all of your shares revert to me. Once we pay the wreckers fairly—and we will, Father—any chance to repay me is impossible. That makes me the majority holder of Pembroke & Kirkwood Trading. I do not regret to inform you, you are quite poor.”
“I won’t stand for this,” he growled. “I’ll expose you!”
“And if you carry out those threats, I’ll simply add criminal libel to your list of growing crimes. Being nothing but a poor man with a title, how will you defend yourself?”
His face went purple with apoplectic rage, his volume like thunder. “This isn’t over!”
Mathew tsked, weary of this battle. “Yes, it is. Money rules the world, Father. You taught me that. It buys silence and favors. It loosens the tongues of corrupt ship captains and will frighten wayward insurance adjusters into saving their own hides. It wins wars and moves mountains. A wealthy man who lives on the fringes of social acceptability is considered eccentric. That same man, if he is penniless, is called mad. No one listens to a madman. The choice is clear: an American prison or freedom? Don’t be a fool.”
“How dare you?” he blustered. “You’re the fool if you think you’ve won!”
No insult from this man would ever hurt again. Fighting another insane urge to giggle, Mathew used his father’s very words against him. “You’ve lost, Lord Pembroke, accept it. Be a man if you are even capable, and walk away with what little dignity you have left.”
On that note, Mathew opened the door to take his leave of him both physically and soon, permanently. He
drew up short as Maggie, a bleary-eyed Mrs. Cohen, and Mr. Kirkwood exited their rooms, roused by the raised voices no doubt.
How much had they heard?
It matters not. I made my choice... Rief.
“I’ll ruin you, boy!” his father shouted, following Mathew into the hallway. “Then I’ll string that fat bastard up for double-crossing me! His little bitch of a daughter will never see my family’s title either. See how he likes that!” With a maniacal laugh, he followed Mathew into the hall. “I’ll—”
Mr. Kirkwood cut him off. “You’ll do what, Pembroke?”
His father stopped his tirade the instant he spied the aforementioned fat bastard. “Kirkwood! What are you doing awake?” he asked with as much courtly decorum as a reckless man in such a state of undress could muster.
“How dare you speak of my daughter in such a way?” Mr. Kirkwood growled, his large chest puffing up as he tightened the tie on his robe.
In his rage, his father had made an unforgivable offense. Mr. Kirkwood would never forgive an insult to his beloved daughter. He would seek retribution, no matter the cost. Fortune smiled on Mathew tonight. When given a choice between fleecing the wreckers and ruining a baron who disparaged Maggie, Mr. Kirkwood would most definitely choose the latter with very little convincing.
“Pay him no heed, Mr. Kirkwood. He was just retiring.” Mathew glanced back at his father and waggled Rief’s sketchbook—proof of his crimes. “Weren’t you, my lord?”
He blustered, nostrils flaring like a bull. Then without another word, he whirled about and slammed his door.
“The shouting woke us, Matty,” Maggie whispered. “What has happened now?”
“Yes, Weston, what was that about, pray tell?” Mr. Kirkwood asked, looking flummoxed. “And at such a late hour.”
“I am sorry that we disturbed your slumber. He’s displeased that we are dropping the charges against Lawson Salvage,” Mathew explained. Though he hoped Mr. Kirkwood hadn’t heard the incriminating parts of the argument, he would cower to no man, ever again. “I also informed him that all of his shares have reverted to me. He is not happy to be so poor, and will be on the next ship off this island.”
Wrecked Page 27
